Day: October 11, 2008

The person who posted the video noted only that she got “booed” but it sounded to me like the crowd was divided. The AP described the applause as “polite applause” (snort! Do they even do polite applause in Philly?). Maybe ST reader GWR, who has said he would be attending tonight’s game, will clarify for us what happened when he gets a chance to post about it.

Beyond his thin resume, his radical left associations, and the fact that he’s portrayed himself for the last two years as someone he’s not, what’s extremely worrisome about a possible Barack Obama presidency is the fact that not only would he implement a solidly liberal agenda – including tax and spend policies – but that he’d have a Democrat Congress, possibly a super-majority, in which to essentially allow him to do whatever he wants.

Today I read from three different people who either support an Obama presidency, or at the very least are not opposed to one, express concern that, well, having a Democrat president stand alongside a Democrat Congress in these uncertain economic times is … troubling.

Ilya Somin, Ross Douthat, and Mike Rappaport have all written in the last couple of days that an Obama victory next month could have long term economic consequences that would be harmful to the American economy, consequences that would be hard to turn back under a future Republican administration and/or Congress.

My response to this is: Welcome to the club! I have to wonder, though, what took these writers – all clearly smart and sharp individuals – so long to come to this conclusion? The subprime lending issue has been brewing for several years now, and the economy has been wobbly for the last year, with ‘experts’ predicting – and in some cases already calling it – a recession. With that in mind, and knowing that Barack Obama is a typical liberal in terms of never finding a government program he didn’t like and wanting to create more, right along with creating unnecessary tax burdens on the so-called “rich” – this in addition to his universal healthcare plan, it’s been a no-brainer for nearly two years now that in these uncertain times, both domestic as well as foreign, that Barack Obama would bring exactly the wrong type of “leadership” this country needs. No, McCain’s not perfect, but giving the Democrats unfettered control of the Congress and the WH, especially with knowing and understanding that their typical plans they propose to get to us out of an economic jam always revolve around spending massive amounts of money in order to pad existing entitlement programs and create new ones, while taxing successful people even more than they already are, would be bad news for America.

Glad these guys have joined the minority view in America right now – too bad it’s probably too late to convince more people to think the same.

Oh, and speaking of the subprime lending issue and the warning bells Republicans were ringing the last several years? In addition to trying via legislation to fix the problem, 19 of them wrote a letter in 2006 expressing their view that Congress needed to act and act swiftly to avoid a potential catastrophe down the road. McCain was one of the Senators who signed it. Barack Obama did not – nor did any other Democrat Senator. Surprise, surprise.

Jules Crittenden’s got the best link round-up and commentary about the report’s findings here. He writes:

The actual finding in the report linked above, by the way, is that she violated an Alaska statute that states any public official’s action that benefits a personal or financial interest is a violation of public trust with regard to the trooper.

Sounds like an ethics law you could use to indict a ham sandwich, though I didn’t notice any mention of penalties in the discussion of the law in the report. There’s also, of course, the question of whether a state trooper who is making threats and behaving erratically â€¦ you know, tasering children â€¦ is more than just a personal interest for someone who is ultimately responsible for the public safety of all Alaskans. Unclear whether the august panel mulled that.

[…]

Anyway, the hacks’ finding regarding the commissioner’s firing is that while the trooper issue played a role, so did other factors actually cited by Palin. It specifically states his firing was a “proper and lawful exercise of her constitutional and statuatory.”

He also notes that media outlets like the AP are distorting the reports of the finding, and provides examples.

Basically, it sounds like Steve Branchflower, the investigator, really had to dig deep and stretch the findings to be able to conclude that Gov. Palin did anything wrong. I found the findings somewhat contradictory, as did Beldar. The bottom line is no matter how much of a dud this report actually is, the fact alone that it states that she “abused her power” is enough for the mediots and usual suspects to conclude that Gov. Palin is no better than some of the worst public office abusers in history, and as we all know, there have been some pretty bad ones.

And as any savvy politico would do, expect the OBiden campaign to – via their surrogates on their campaign and in the MSM – keep this news front and center for the next several weeks in an attempt to put the McCain campaign out of the running altogether. As Ed Morrissey notes, this will not affect her standing with the people who already support her, but the undecideds may be another story altogether.